Tag Archives: My new English words

pernicious : having a harmful effect, especially in a gradual or subtle way. prone: likely to or liable to suffer from, do, or experience something, typically something regrettable or unwelcome. Hindsight bias has pernicious effects on the evaluations of decision makers. Consider low-risk surgical intervention in which an unpredictable accident occurred that caused the patient’s…

Scorching: very hot, extremely hot ( as verb: burn the surface of (something) with flame or heat.) Noah Walker stands carefully on the roof of his house, takes a moment to ensure his balance, and removes the Yankees cap from his head to wipe the sweat off his brow under the scorching early-June sun. Scorching:…

The tendency to like (or dislike) everything about a person including things you have not observed – is known as the halo effect. You meet a woman named Joan at a party and find her personable and easy to talk to. Now her name comes up as someone who could be asked to contribute to…

Stifle – restrain (a reaction) or stop oneself acting on (an emotion). Stamina – the ability to sustain prolonged physical or mental effort. In a typical demonstration, participants who are instructed to stifle their emotional reaction to an emotionally charged film will later perform poorly on a test of physical stamina –…

Fin: a flattened appendage on various parts of the body of many aquatic vertebrates and some invertebrates, including fish and cetaceans, used for propelling, steering, and balancing. To resist the illusion, there is only one thing you can do: you must learn to mistrust your impressions of the length of lines when fins are attached to them.…

Agony – extreme physical or mental suffering. shuttering – close the shutters of (a window or building). As someone who has felt, first-hand, the agony of shuttering the doors of his startup, I feel Paul’s pain. But I want to focus on what Branson, a self-made billionaire, who is more often right than wrong, said about ride-sharing…

Discern – perceive or recognize (something). Rotting – decompose Gazelle – a small slender antelope that typically has curved horns and a yellowish-brown coat with white underparts, found in open country in Africa and Asia. Carcass – the dead body of an animal. Ability to discern the feelings of others also protected us in a very specific way: ‘your…

Evolve – develop gradually, especially from a simple to a more complex form. Amid – surrounded by; in the middle of. Gradual – taking place or progressing slowly or by degrees. Abrupt – sudden and unexpected. We humans evolved to survive amid the gradual, predictable changes of the natural world, but now our livelihoods are threatened by abrupt, unpredictable…